Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Facebook wants to own you forever!

Facebook's terms of service (TOS) changed on February 4, 2009. They used to say that when you closed an account on their site, any rights they claimed to the original content you uploaded would expire. Not anymore.

Anything you've ever posted, uploaded, or linked to on your facebook page can be used at anytime in the future even if you delete it and cancel your account.

You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.

And the real 'stick-it-to-ya', the TOS was altered without warning, or notification. They simply extended their rights to your content until eternity, and did not ask your permission.

Facebook czar, Mark Zuckerberg, tried to quell the outrage with a blog post, that included the line, "In reality, we wouldn't share your information in a way you wouldn't want."

I'm sorry but does anything in the above clause sound like you have the right to stop or the ability to prevent facebook from using your info, images etc. any way they want to, ever?